Steadroy Cutie Olivero Benjamin Attorney General and Minister for Legal Affairs, Public Safety, and Labour
The government intends to make amendments to the laws governing the Child Justice (Amendment) Act of 2018 to treat young criminals like adults.
In recent weeks, children as young as 13 years have been part of heinous criminal activities in Antigua and Barbuda including rape and murder.
But according to the laws governing these youngsters’ minors under the age of 12 cannot be held liable for criminal offenses and those over 14 are liable to spend no more than three years in prison.
The law also prevents youngsters aged 12 and 13 from receiving jail time however they can receive other sentences or refer to for counseling
But Attorney General Steadroy Benjamin said on Observer radio on Saturday afternoon that the Gaston Browne-led administration intends to make changes to the constitution.
“Many persons are of the opinion that the Child Justice Act somehow prohibits the police from arresting juveniles who commit some serious offenses. But that is not so. Nonetheless, certain lawyers have spoken with me and certain stakeholders have spoken with me as well too. So we shall be looking at that law with the specific purpose of ensuring that the law is so drafted that when young people commit heinous offenses, they are dealt with just as adults in the state of Antigua and Barbuda,” Benjamin said
Adding, “And I’m very concerned because it appears now from recent incidents that most of these offenses are committed by these young people”
Benjamin said before the amendments can be made, there will be a meeting of stakeholders to determine the best way forward
“We understand that all stakeholders must meet and determine how we proceed, but we are not treating these young people with kid gloves any more. Most of them are hooligans and they’ll be dealt with as they ought to be. We are going to maintain law and order in Antigua and Barbuda,” Benjamin said
These meetings, according to him are expected to be held as early as next week, according to Benjamin, who is also the national security minister
“We have some meetings scheduled for next week and the week thereafter. But the people of this nation must be assured that when young deviants go out of their way to make life unbearable. People are scared of these young people, then the law will come forth and take its proper place to ensure that that behavior is curtailed,” he said
The government has already increased police patrol in the city and installed CCTV cameras in several hot spots.
Last week, a 16-year-old boy was placed on remand after he was charged with the murder of Syrian businessman Roudi Shmaly.
The juvenile justice system was designed to divert young people from the devastating punishments of criminal courts and to encourage rehabilitation based on the requirements of each individual young criminal. However, the current state of the system to ensure rehabilitation is sadly lacking. Trying these young kids as adults is not the answer and I expected far better from a Minister who is well schooled in the law. Their current situation is a tug-of-war between the potential of these young criminals to rehabilitate and redeem themselves versus heavy sentencing in jails, which has a slew of unintended repercussions. The juvenile justice system needs to be reformed in order to provide more effective treatment and reduce mental health issues within youth.
Kids brain’s structure and function undergo considerable changes during adolescence. As such, these kids are more vulnerable to extremely irrational decision-making caused by impulsivity and reward or sensation-seeking behavior due to their psychosocial immaturity. Children’s brain regions connected to impulse control and emotional maturity are still developing. The lack of brain development makes a lot of children more susceptible to committing crimes. Our current prison structure is inadequate for adult offenders much less these juveniles. Trying these kids as adults is a really bad idea and we are just making even more hardened criminals of them by trying them as adults and incarcerating them with hard core no turning back criminals.
I embrace your contribution except for the part where you give the impression that they will be tried as adults. I don’t think that is the intention going forward. The place where they are housed is of concern to all who works in the system. You should make yourself available to part of the discussion.
Maybe if it was someone from your family that was killed you would have had a different opinion
I totally agree with the governor about treating young people like adults when they commit a crime because they know what they are doing…. also the government should pass a law about the wearing of hoodies in Antígua because this also help commit crimes and murders in our country
The objective is to have justice and to stop crime but the psychological development of the child and an adult is vast it’s not the same children are children and their capacity and their Mental maturity would be a terrible wrong by our legislators to make this change that is why the framers of this act has it done this way so Mr AG even though you mean well children are children rehabilitation is proven to work it can be done with the right resources and implementation things can be better let’s give our children a fighting chance don’t count them out and cast them into the dungeon spoil of harden criminals this one is certainly above all of us pay grade let’s hear from our spiritual leaders let’s show some compassion and love on this one
Who are the spiritual leaders you have in mind. Whoever you have in mind why do you think that they are equipped to give the necessary counseling.
Rehabilitation my ****** if that my punishment …… Whats going stop me from doing it again…… Just do what I wanna do… N then act like Im gonna change after